Order on the border: Hope and need blur line dividing neighbouring nations

The Petrapole rail station is situated 100-odd km from Kolkata. Just a little ahead lies Bangladesh, and in between, the International Border.

| TNN | Feb 17, 2014, 05.56 PM IST

PETRAPOLE (INDO-BANGLA BORDER): It is here that you begin to notice the uniformity. The colour that both neighbours share on their flags, albeit a different hue, in abundance. Just one bare tree, among the infinite leafy expanse, strikes the sole jarring note in this soulful harmony. Or is it simply gearing up for resurrection, biding its time to outshine them all?

This is the Petrapole rail station, a 100-odd km from Kolkata. Just a little ahead lies Bangladesh, and in between, the International Border. But it seems like just a degree of separation, a mere formality, especially to the Bollywood buff with a pre-conceived notion about cross-border heat. Not a hundred proud flags fluttering in the air of hostility, no hardened faces, and certainly no glare. In fact, there is an unexpected stillness in the air, broken intermittently by the cackle of babies and the occasional blare of Bengali songs from a cheap soundbox playing nearby.

This is not what you expect at the dividing line of two nations - children playing building blocks with stonechips from the road, and grown-ups building bridges for a smoother tomorrow. The only thing that does change, visibly, is the signal on cellphones - IND Airtel becomes Warid BD when you take two steps forward, changes back when you take one step back.

"There's no difference at all! Doesn't even feel like a different country," exclaims first-timer Narayang Badal, a tourist from Dhaka. "I have travelled to many countries. However, this doesn't generate the same feeling as crossing the border elsewhere," says Bangladeshi businessman Islam Ivy.

So the phonetically similar Bangladesh and 'bidesh' meaning 'foreign' in Bengali, is a misnomer in this context.

Sovan Tarafdar, a CA student from Dum Dum who had gone to Dhaka carrying medicine for relatives, agrees. "It's difficult to treat India and Bangladesh as different countries," he smiles. At the ground-level, the West Bengal policeman who escorts the bus from Dhaka out of the Zero-point, and the conductor of the vehicle, share friendly jibes. Friendly without doubt, because both of them address each other by their first names. Bimal Sarkar from the land of Pabna makes an outlandish claim. "Ekhon to mone koren, dui sarkar-i ek (Now, might as well consider both governments to be one). The more often Sk Hasina comes to India and Manmohan Singh goes to Dhaka, the better for us 'Bangal' minorities," Sarkar sports a mischieveous grin as he speaks.

Unfortunately, it's not utopian border bonhomie. Apprehension, however little, remains. "We're here for medical treatment. Please speak to my husband," says a panicky woman fresh off the bus from Dhaka. "I've been here several times, yes, 10, 20, 50 times at least. My name? Hahaha," the husband in his 60s hurries off. Fear of persecution? Prosecution? That's possibly the last nut left to crack, in a nutshell.

But not all Bengal's neighbours are living in a shell. Even at sundown, the ray of hope on the hundreds of faces crossing the border everyday is clear as the day. Hope for cultural exchange, intellectual stimulation. Medical relief. Students crossing over, hoping against hope to beat life's third degree with a degree from an Indian institution. Satyajit Ray followers equally awestruck by Syed Muztaba Ali's genius. Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay's house off Bongaon still inspiring the starry-eyed surprise. And the risk taken, the sacrifices made. Leaving families behind for months, life in makeshift shanties and juggling multiple roles - that of a student and tutor, role model and follower, buyer and seller. No need to look far, any college close to the border throws up a number of underdog stories. Some of them, to use a Muztaba Ali imagery, are hanging on to a branch on a stiff cliff, and yet reaching out for the wild grapes just an inch beyond reach. Inspirational.

Take Arpan, a visually challenged Bangladeshi youth who was packed off to India by his parents as a child. "He adapted beautifully and passed exams with flying colours, although with a writer. He never took Braille, hence never managed to land a job. You can catch him today selling newspapers on the Bongaon local. But listen closely, you'll be bowled over by his English diction," says Sutapa Sengupta, a professor. "There's a girl from Bangladesh studying in my college. She says she came here for better education standards. She would travel once every two weeks to her country. Since we're close friends, she confided in me, else even I wouldn't have known. But there are several like her among us, who cross over for access to quality education," says S K Mukto, a student of a Bengal college barely 50 km from the border. Such struggle stories are easy to find.

"We understand who's from where while travelling in trains. They don't say Sealdah or Park Circus. They say India," says a professor from the same college. "An ex-student, Tapas from Bangladesh, not only graduated from this college, but now has landed a job in Bengal after cracking the School Service Commission test," says another teacher.

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